Hofmeyr now wants a Wexit

The singer-activist has casually longed for the secession of the Western Cape from the rest of SA.

Afrikaner rights activist Steve Hofmeyr is now longing for a sort of Brexit of his own, and even casually tweeted that a Wexit, the exit of the Western Cape from South Africa, might be possible.

Hofmeyr tweeted: “Watch for Bexit contagion. Fexit, Nexit, Grexit, Swexit, Itexit and even Gexit. And Wexit (Western Cape!)”. To one of his followers, ulv løgner @Sinestra_Malum, who responded “@steve_hofmeyr if Wexit happens I’m there tomorrow.” Hofmeyr added: “Brexit did it. Brits leads the way to self-determination.”

They are far from the first people to long for the secession of the province.

The Cape Party, a political party that sought to use all constitutional and legal means to bring about independence for the Western Cape, Northern Cape (excluding two districts), six municipalities in the Eastern Cape, and one municipality in the Free State grew out of a Facebook group in 2007 and is led by Jack Miller, who worked as an actor when he first assumed the leadership. In 2009, it had a membership of about 1000 people, according to their Wikipedia entry.

It was on the provincial ballot of the Western Cape in the South African general elections of 2009, where it received 2,552 votes, or 0.13% of the vote. The party complained bitterly that their posters were removed from poles by other parties.

The party cites various legal provisions and frameworks to support its position that the “Cape Nation” has a right to self-government. These include: the South African constitution, which guarantees the right to self-determination of any community sharing a common cultural and language heritage; the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which states that all people have the right to self-determination and to pursue economic, social and cultural development, and that they may freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources without prejudice.

The covenant also declares that states party to it must promote the realisation of those rights article 1 of the United Nations Charter, various UN General Assembly resolutions dealing with self-determination, sovereignty and independence; chapter 1, article 20 of the Organization of African Unity’s African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which states that all people have an inalienable right to self-determination, and declares that oppressed people have the right to free themselves from domination by any means recognised by the international community. (The Cape Party refers to this document as “African Union: Human and Peoples’ Rights”.)

Further, according to Wiki, the constitutional law scholar Pierre de Vos, however, has said that the Cape Party could not secede without a revolution. As the constitution has created a unitary state, he has said that threatening the unity of the country would be treason.

The Cape Party has said that it will seek to build consensus with the dominant political parties in the Western Cape, such as the Democratic Alliance. In response, Democratic Alliance federal executive chairperson James Selfe said that the Cape Party was “not a party we take seriously”.

Is Hofmeyr being a bit of a revolutionary?

In the wake of Britain exiting the European Union (EU), the South African presidency has moved to reassure the country and investors that SA will be able to weather the fallout from Britain’s EU departure.

South Africa’s financial system was resilient and would be able to deal with any shocks arising from Britain’s exit from the European Union, President Jacob Zuma’s office said on Friday.